Variations on a Theme
by mistrali
Summary: Discipline, in all its permutations.
1. Small Things - Tris and Daja

****Small Things - Daja & Tris****

"I wish I could do small, useful things with my power," said Tris wistfully, watching as Daja ignited the candles at their table with a seed of fire. Daja looked at her in surprise, and she blushed. She hadn't meant to speak aloud!

"Most people would consider saving your home from pirates useful enough to clear a lifetime's worth of debt," said Daja dryly. As Tris paled, she added hastily, "And you did all those past-seeing spells with Niko last year. You found where the plague came from. That's small and useful."

She spread a cloth on the table and began to lay out silver spoons, forks and knives. "I know, and I am glad I could do something important," said Tris, following Daja into the kitchen and fetching their best plates from the cupboard. "But some of that was Niko, and it wasn't permanent. I mean, something I could touch or craft. I like my magic now, of course, but weather's so flashy and temperamental - here now, gone in a moment."

"I'm just lighting candles for Rosethorn's birthday dinner," the other girl pointed out. She set a bunch of deep purple crocuses and white irises in the vase and continued, "That's hardly so useful. You're the one who did all the cooking, and you would've done the washing up if Lark hadn't put her foot down."

"I like housework," protested Tris, "and it was Sandry's turn to cook." Both girls rolled their eyes. Sandry still baulked at cooking, calling it finicky, although after a year at Discipline, she could at least make a simple, edible meal of couscous and spiced chickpeas without supervision. She would have struggled with things like spiced lamb, gooseberry preserve and fruitcake.

"None of us can cook as well as you, not even Rosethorn," said Daja. "Isn't that magic? Frostpine says it is. He can't even boil milk," she added, rolling her eyes. "He always sours it. He can make a mean ugali - it's a dish from Mbau - but he says he learned that from Gorse in their novice days."

"Frostpine knew Gorse when he was a novice?" asked Tris, eyes wide. "What was he like? He would have been-"

"The same as now?" said Daja, with a shrug. "I really don't know. I think they lost touch after Gorse became a dedicate."

"I'll ask him tonight," said Tris. She beamed and hurried off to put the finishing touches to her meal.

Daja shook her head. Tris still believed her power was somehow not as good as smithing or thread or plant magic. Daja couldn't blame her: the Chandlers hadn't exactly been supportive, and besides, Daja knew what it was to be cast out without a home by her own people.


	2. Woven of Things That Grow - Briar & Daja

****Woven of Things That Grow****

"That needs to be thinner, boy," said Rosethorn, taking the frame from Briar's hands. "And they'll do better with copper wire – ask Daja for some of that. It's more flexible than vines, and it helps bind the sprigs."

Briar frowned. "Why do we need these wreath things, anyway?"

Rosethorn looked up from scrubbing the table, one eyebrow arched. "You tell me. What do juniper and cedar mean?"

"Juniper for protection, cedar for balance," he recited.

"And they're decorations for Longnight. Which is __not__ when I celebrate my birthday," she said pointedly.

"I got fourteen to make: I counted the little nails in the walls and doors," he said, with a sigh. "Then I got to charm 'em and hang 'em all over the cottage. Why didn't we make these last year?"

"We didn't have time. We'd the blue pox to fight." She drew the gods-circle on her chest. "Mila help us, I didn't think we'd get through for a while there."

__You almost didn't,__ he said, wrapping his arms around her waist. She cleared her throat, her creamy cheeks turning pink. __I'm here, aren't I?__ __Hurry up, now. We need to have these up in time for the Midwinter feast.__

He blinked, and hurried back outside. A feast? Maybe religious folk had the right of it after all.

* * *

__Daja?__ he called, through their connection. __You want to help shape the copper wire for these?__

__I've just finished with Frostpine,__ she replied. __And that looks more interesting than door handles. What are they?__ she asked curiously.__The red and white bows look pretty.__

__They're glitter for Longnight. It's like Midsummer, but at night, and with folk dancing and singing in the streets. And a feast, Rosethorn said. It's some Emelan thing, maybe; they never did it in Sotat.__

She gave a mental shrug. __I wouldn't know. We never learned about __kaq__religions. But if Rosethorn wants it…__

__She'll hang us in the well,__ they chorused.

He grinned and went back to trimming the juniper.


	3. Stargazing - Tris and Sandry

**Stargazing**

It took until Tris's fifth day at Discipline for the skies to clear. It was already properly dark by the time she'd fidgeted through supper, dressed and cleaned her teeth. She grabbed her star charts and slate and hurried up to the roof, then scowled. There was someone lying in her usual place; the braid dangling from the edge told her clearly enough who it was.

"Don't you have sewing to do?" she growled, hurrying up to the noble girl. "That's my spot. I'm supposed to track the stars while Niko's gone."

The girl sat up and half-turned. "There's no need to be rude," she said, so softly that Tris felt herself blush. "I've as much right to be here as you."

Tris sighed, thought of Niko's admonitions, and tried again. "Fine. Would you please move? This spot is better for looking at the constellations, all right?"

The noble - Sandry, Tris reminded herself - didn't even bother to get up, but brushed off her skirts and slid over to the other, lower side of the roof. Tris frowned. Had Sandry been crying? Close up, under the torchlight from the courtyard, her nose was red and swollen.

Still, to Tris's eternal relief, for once she didn't seem to want to talk any more. Instead she raised her knees to her chest and closed her eyes. Tris opened her charts to the first page of Goose Moon, then began to sketch The Awl with a piece of chalk Niko had lent her. She didn't care to try her skills at ink just yet. They sat there for a long while, Tris scribbling and Sandry meditating. At length Tris finished her sketches and went to clamber down the ladder, her things clutched awkwardly in her left hand. She looked warily at her housemate, whose silence was starting to unnerve her, but decided to chance it. If Sandry was going to ambush her at the trapdoor, she would just be extra careful coming up from the privy. She sent a wind ahead of her as she ascended, just in case.

Sure enough, it picked up rustling.  
Tris clambered over the edge of the roof, red-faced, to find her housemate examining the book she'd left open. It was Tris's only remaining novel from Ninver, __Beyond the Glaive: Fianola's Legacy.__

"I used to have this!" exclaimed Sandry, high-voiced, as Tris was about to blister her for touching someone else's belongings. "I bought it at a fair in Capchen, with my - I mean, for three copper crescents. It was my first time bargaining on my own. Only, I didn't like knights very much." She tried to smile. "I'd rather have read about Trader legends, but they're not written down often."

Tris hesitated. Mila witness, who was this girl who struck bargains with booksellers and defended thieves?

"You're telling me a tale," she said, still suspicious. "How could a noble know about Trader stories? I suppose the Trader girl's been teaching you."

"My nursemaid taught me," said Sandry flatly. She looked fixedly at her hands. "She died of the smallpox in Zakdin. My parents, too."

Even Tris didn't doubt that. She drew the gods-circle on her chest and resettled herself on the straw beside Sandry. "Is - is that why you're here?" she began awkwardly. "Don't you have any other family?"

This time Sandry let out a huff of breath that was halfway to a chuckle. "They'd probably just send me here anyway. This place is more interesting than living with Uncle. My parents travelled... well, almost all my life, so I never really met my cousins until... recently."

__That's nobles for you,__ thought Tris, as Sandry lapsed back into silence and started to chew on her braid. __Why can't they stay at home like sensible people? If__ I __had a whole palace here, I'd have a library made out of the lower floors and live in the turret. I could command storms just fine from there.__


	4. Skating Lessons - Tris and Daja

A few yards ahead, Daja was looping elegant circles around the posts. That only drove Tris to try harder - she was strong, and wasn't used to being left behind. She prodded a couple of excitable northeast winds and tried to twine them around her ankles like straps or lead them along behind her, but released them after realising that a tornado on a snow slope wasn't a good idea.

__I knew I wouldn't like this__, she said, feeling the first sparks of irritation. __I'll mostly be inside, researching or studying. I can take lessons later. __Mila knew she wouldn't be going to parties, after all, so she'd manage it in the spare time between lectures and the private mathematics tuitions she normally gave.

Daja sighed and glided closer, her braids flaring behind her in the wind. __Skating lessons with a local teacher cost half a silver argib a month,__ she pointed out, in what Tris thought of as her bargaining-with-hamots voice. __Tris, you can't lock yourself up in your dormitory for two years. You'll be starting fresh, as an adult, without an advantage. It's about building relationships, merchant girl. People you skate with, and make friends with, can be customers later. __

"Yes, you're right. At least I'll be earning my keep, I suppose." Making a face, Tris hung on to Daja's arm and concentrated on moving each foot forwards. It was a little bit like walking through sand, but with skates instead of barefoot. Forward, right; forward, left. She slipped again, caught herself, and kept going. "Now turn," murmured Daja. Tris let go of Daja's arm, wavered and spun, and smacked face-first onto solid ice. __Runog curse it!__ She wiped at her stinging face with a glove. __I'm a weather mage. It's undignified for us to be lying on the ground like this. __

In response, Daja sent her a couple of flashes of falling on the ice with her Namornese students. __Try being a smith-mage, __she said wryly. __At least ice doesn't mind you.__ Despite herself, Tris laughed. "Well," she drawled, "I mind ice. I think I'll hate it outright by the time this is done."


	5. Turquoise - SandryDaja

_Warning for very light pre-slash (i.e. _Circlecest_, although they're not a circle at this point)._

**Turquoise**

The beach was quiet, at dawn. Daja glanced at the water, sifting sand through her fingertips. She was a landswoman now. What would her family have carried from here? What would they have traded?

She looked up at the cliffs - dizzying, forlorn, overlooking pale blue ocean. Uneny would have liked those bluffs. She'd never seen sea this colour before coming to Emelan.

"Copper for your thoughts?"

Sandry, beside her, shook the water from her hair.

Daja started. "Oh - I was wondering if Imperial has a word for this blue."

Sandry grinned at her. "I'd call it… turquoise?"

"Hmm," said Daja, with a small smile of her own. "Very lugsha of you. In Tradertalk it's just 'blue'."

"You'll have to teach me how to speak Tradertalk like a Trader someday."

Daja inched closer to Sandry, as close as she dared without touching. Her stomach felt full of butterflies.

Her friend had other ideas. Sandry's arm came up around her, and she rested her head on Daja's shoulder.


	6. Coronation Blues

**Coronation Blues**

_Duke's Citadel, Summersea, The 14th day of Seed Moon, K.F. 147_

"My dear, I have a proposal for you," said Vedris. He sat straight in his chair, but there was a set to his jaw that had not been there yesterday evening. Sandry's first thought, as so often these days, was of his health. She peered up at his face in the lamplight. "Everything's all right, I hope, Uncle?" she asked cautiously. "If you want me to draft any more reports..."

He smiled, then, and kissed her on the top of the head. "I wager you'll have more than enough drafting to do after the tax reforms," he told her. "But Sandrilene, how would you feel about becoming my heir?"

She might have squeaked, or gasped. "Uncle," she heard herself saying, "This is a poor joke."

But her great-uncle's mouth didn't so much as twitch. Come to that, when had she ever known him to joke about the realm?

And why was he asking Sandry, anyway? A duchy, even a small one, wasn't an easy thing to manage. Were she in the duke's shoes, she didn't think she could have put a temple-raised thread mage on the throne. "I don't mean to sound ungrateful, but what about Cole?" she ventured. "He's more familiar than I am with the military, and such things."

Vedris cleared his throat. "You have a talent for administration, and the staff here know and respect you. Cole is a younger son, and besides, he is happier and more useful at sea. I realise, however, that you have your family to consider, and travel plans that this may interfere with," he added. "I had thought of your co-ruling with Gospard, if that makes your decision any easier."

He waited while Sandry, for once lost for words, sipped at her tea. It was rather beautiful, sweet and flavoured with rose petals. The offer made her stomach churn with emotions she was afraid to examine: apprehension, sadness, excitement.

"I'll need a few days to think about it," she said at last, smiling at him. "And, really, Uncle, with you, Erdogun, Tamar, Kwaben and Oama advising me so well on the realm, it doesn't feel half as much like work as it should."

Vedris chuckled outright. "You are learning tact, my dear, as well as flattery," he said, wrapping her into a hug. He rang for the servant to take away the tea tray, and rose to his feet. Sandry, catching herself in a yawn, wished her uncle a good night and went to her rooms, which seemed more than usually draughty. She would have to have the castle done up, she thought drowsily, if funds permitted.

You're being silly, fretting over what your friends and family will say, Sandry told herself firmly. But her mind raced when she tried to sleep, let alone concentrate on any of her other work. How much else there was to think about, even before the coronation date was set: her uncle's will and abdication papers to be signed, wardrobes to be looked over, advisors to sift through, pirates to ward off, interest groups to placate. Traders, she thought grouchily, glaring at the unfinished report on her desk, were happy to appeal to the state when it suited them, but kept themselves otherwise apart. And the merchants simmered with indignation over things done to the third and fourth cousins of acquaintances.

Finally she sighed, cast aside her report (the third one this week on harbour space) and grabbed for a handful of thread instead. Embroidery had always comforted her ever since Hatar, and now she stitched almost without thought, using her crystal to save her eyes from strain in the candlelight.

That was how Daja found her an hour and a half later at dawn, bent over four skeins of silk in different shades of blue and lilac.  
"You should get more sleep. You're starting to look like Crane on a bad day," said her sister. Daja looked impossibly awake, in a fresh cotton tunic, orange hemp breeches and two white hair ties.  
"Only starting to?" grumbled Sandry, through dry lips. She felt puffy-eyed and chufflebrained. "I'm glad you think so much of my looks."  
Daja grinned at her. "Now you sound like him, too. Come to the shrine with me? It'll be good for your vanity." Sandry stuck out her tongue, but set aside her silk and went to wash, drink some tea and fetch the sweet pea blooms she kept as tokens for Pirisi. The embroidery, and her worries, could wait until the afternoon.


End file.
